This is Why I Hate You
by philosophy-toastie
Summary: PreDeathly Hallows. One shot, written in the night before it came out. A Lucius Malfoy in Azkaban fic. He discovers why he hates Arthur Weasley so much.


Swallowing hard, trying to keep his head in the air as much as one could when you were dressed in Azkaban robes, rather than the finery he was used to, Lucius Malfoy prepared to step into his prison cell with as much dignity as he could muster. Unfortunately for him, his guard had entirely different ideas. He was shoved into the cell by a big, muscular arm square in his back and a nasty throaty sound told Lucius he had been spat on. Lucius Malfoy had never been _spat_ on.

Nothing had ever been more insulting in his life. He had been dragged before trials again and again, but he faced them with cold and calculating confidence. Being here not only meant he had failed, but it also meant everything he believed would redeem him had failed him instead. That guard spitting at his feet didn't just disgust him, it told him, with a crushing clarity, that his money and name may get him a long way outside of these four, grey, cold walls, but only served to bring him down within them.

He told himself over and over whilst he sat in that cell, at least for the first few hours, that he shouldn't care what some stupid mudblood guard thought of him. It shouldn't matter. No matter what robes he wore, no matter where he was, he was _always_ Lucius Malfoy, and always better than everyone else. For the first time, he didn't believe himself.

Sitting there, trying to make himself comfortable in his quiet grey cell, trying to reassure himself that soon Voldemort would prevail, would do what had to be done and he would be free again, he ran his hands over his head, feeling the prickle of his hair where it had been so rudely hacked off by a big female guard. Back then, whilst there were guards and officials watching him, he flashed glares at them all and challenged whatever they were trying to do, having said to the woman at the time something along the lines of 'Think I'm going to hang myself with it, or what?' Soon, as he was given his robes and dragged to his cell, unused to the air, freezing cold with Dementors against his scalp, he accepted this with a quiet dignity, as he was still a Malfoy, after all. Only as he sat there on his own, his blond hair prickling against his palm, memory of the guard's face imprinted on his mind, he couldn't convince himself of his own superiority.

There was no real way to measure time in here, just meals, but these were overtaken in his mind with the images of the silent sneers on the guards faces. He remembers one time when the fat, podgy, but quite large guard was watching him with a smug, satisfied smile on his face. Lucius had looked up at him and recognised the smile immediately and told him defiantly he wasn't eating it because he thought it was poisoned. The reply was unforgettable, and if, no, no, _when_, he ever got out of here, Lucius wanted to kill this man inside out.

"You don't deserve poison. I wouldn't let them do anything less than suck your soul out your mouth, Mr Malfoy."

Lucius was used to shrugging off people hating him because he had the power and influence to make up for it. He didn't care for love nor hate, just what he could control and what he wanted. Now, every remark, stare, prickle of his hair against his hand and gob of spit that landed on his prison robes stung him, as he could not control it.

One day, this had set him thinking. There was little else to do when you were slowly going mad in a freezing cold grey box. He thought about Arthur Weasley. If there was one man Lucius Malfoy hated, it was Arthur. One thing which confused Lucius the most was why he never thought of his own family, of Narcissa, of Draco, until he thought of Arthur Weasley and his army of ginger bloodtraitor brats. It was simple, really. Arthur was the only person in the world Lucius could bring himself to love or hate. It turned out to be the latter, simply because he could do the former.

Lucius hated mudbloods, yes. He hated the guards. He hated a lot of vague, faceless groups. But that was prejudice, not hate from the heart. Lucius did hate Arthur Weasley, from the heart; deeply, truly, madly, he hated this man. He was many I things /I Lucius hated, a bloodtraitor, ginger, a Muggle lover, poor. But that wasn't really why, when you looked in the depths of Lucius' heart, he hated Arthur.

He hated Arthur because he could love his family and he knew _how_ to love them. Lucius had long thought, and still did, to a large extent, that money, power and pride were how you loved your family. To be able to give them everything they wanted, to help create the best of all possible worlds for them to live in, and be prepared to kill to do so. That was Lucius Malfoy's vision of love. To teach his son to be as proud and as good a wizard as he was, and his father was, and his father was. He could never tell his son or his wife three words, three words that Arthur Weasley could say to all eight members of his family if he wanted to. _I love you_.

Lucius could not do it, and as he sat in that prison cell, being spat on, being insulted, having his hair hacked away, he realised why. He had thought everything he did was for the love of his family, but now it came down to it, he was not prepared to give up his soul for them. It would do them no good. Surrendering his soul would not make the world any better for his son, it would not help any of the dreadful situations he imagined both Narcissa and even Draco being put in. It would only make them worse.

Lucius Malfoy hated Arthur Weasley because he envied him, because Arthur knew that love was not giving up everything you had for someone, but giving up a part of yourself. Now Lucius could not feel richer or more powerful than the eccentric red head, he realised Arthur had something he didn't. For the first time in his life, he felt inferior.

That was why the only person reserved a special place in Lucius Malfoy's heart was Arthur Weasley.


End file.
